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  • emotions and politics
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 philosophers and emotions



those early philosophers who looked at 
philosophy of the physical world,
its origins, what is real, what things are composed of 
are interesting
but their suppositions
are outdated and only of curiosity value

with socrates and plato there was interest in behaviour and ethics...
in how people should behave

 these philosophers did not appear to notice that
the difficulty of determining how people should behave 
is purely due to the presence of emotions

socrates and plato 
could determine that their was good and evil 
and they could discuss and propose methods to reduce evil
but since they were unaware of the root cause of 'evil' 
their methods of dealing with it were 
inevitably hobbled

marcus aurelius and many others
stress the importance of stoicism
the reason that justifies stoicism 

is that emotions untempered 
are purely commands for the survival of dna 
but each individual is not bound to this cause
rather each individual is bound to seek happiness

survival of dna issues commands,
these are the goals which we are urged to pursue
to provide happiness 
but these goals may or may not include
communality or sustainability
it is like ordering off a menu

but the human cortex,
able to evaluate different types of happiness,
is able to realize that the  search for happiness
must include
  communality or sustainability
​
the pursuit of happiness along with
communality and sustainability
is the essence of stoicism 



​most discussion about the philosophy of emotions
becomes a matter of argument about semantics and definitions
with various people proposing characteristics, categories, causes and effects of emotions
and different schools of thought with various proponents
all vying for position

but the whole point about emotions is totally missed 
if the origin and purpose of emotions is not considered in the first place
to bypass the creator of emotions, dna 
and the purpose dna has with emotions,
means that further discussion of emotions is useless
like trying to analyse a car
but never knowing that the purpose of the car is transport

since dna is the generator of emotion
all the discussion that vaguely implies 
that we create it ourselves 
is void
if our cortex created it 
it would not be autonomous
it is autonomous

dna created emotions as a directive programme
to direct humans 
for the survival of dna only
nothing to do with any benefit for humans
our cortex is slow to realize this 
and thinks that emotions 
are itself
this makes a near perfect disguise...
this ensures that dna maintains control
​without being detected

emotions also keep us confused about life
​and permanently given to believe
that life is a mystery if we are secular
or life is explained by god(s) if we are religious

for simpler creatures like ants
a directive programme doesn't have to be so smart
but with our developed cortex
the emotion programme has to be very clever... 
...​it is

one commonly held attitude is that emotions cannot be defined

given that everyone roughly knows what is meant by emotions
​and there is a vast amount of common ground in that knowledge
and given their vast importance
it is not helpful to avoid defining emotions

the definition is easy 
it is derivative, and lazy to avoid definition of emotions

philosophers dealings with emotions 
have 
listed them 
categorized them
examined different types
used different names
and relationships with other concepts :
feelings, passions, pathos, affects,
wonder, beatitude, glory, competition,
strength of mind, sexuality,
understanding, affections,
concupiscible and irascible emotions,
self and other,
benevolence and malevolence, 
stoicism and conflict,
emotions either good and evil,
or directed at good or evil,
moods,sentiments, calmness, turbulence,
 relationship to morality,
 relationship to will, reason, mind, body,
 relationship to 
appetites, judgements, beliefs, volitions
and knowledge, pleasure, ethics,
and relationships to
the soul, physiology, perception, violence,
perturbations,associations, passivity.

none of these or any other considerations
can be done properly without defining emotion.
none of the above philosophers were aware 
that emotions are a dna programme.

therefore all their thoughts on the matter 
are missing the point.
they all believe that emotions are somehow
born in our minds
in our conscious mind, our cortex,
but they fail to acknowledge 
that their origin is from 
an autonomous part of our mind
and that only dna can create the programme
of an autonomous neural network

since most of these philosophers didn't know
about dna or neural networks or darwinian theory,
no surprise that they did not see the importance 
of autonomy,
thoughts out of control,
​as emotions are...
deliberately made so 
​by dna

antonio damasio accords more weight to emotions
​ than has happened in the past
he points what he calls out descarte's error
in dividing mind and body
and calling them separate

it appears then from this 
that damasio thinks that emotions are body
just like a muscle
but should not be considered separate from mind

but emotions are not in that category of body at all
they are dominant neural programs
whether anatomical, physiological or pharmacological
so the connection with descartes is non existent 

damasio's expositions on the subjects
of self and mind and emotion and feeling
​get cluttered with a semantic mish mash
he coins his own vocabulary 
and anguishes over differences 
like feeling vs emotion
things that all humans have throughout all their lives
every second, every day
humans don't need to have their vocabulary corrected
on these matters
the use of the words is convention 
not for one person to establish a mortgage on

the important point is not a contorted 
development of a theory
​ of emotion, self and its' relation to cortex

the important point is
 that all emotion is a dna survival programme
 
and none of its genesis is cortical

all conscious cortical activity ceases
without emotion
​without emotion you can not want
so you can not want to think

Socrates sees emotions as adjustable by reason 
but notes that some emotions are very resistant to reason

he is prepared to admit that some emotions 
can be caused and sustained through
non rational means

this is like saying that wars 
can occasionally cause some damage
to people and property

all emotion is non reasoning
it is the dna preserving fuel 
that lights up
thoughts, words and actions
either as positive or as negative

​the thoughts, words and actions
are just subject matter
the lighting up 
​is emotion 

​Socrates then offers as reasons for 
​some emotions being caused and explained
 through non rational  means
he says that either this is because of
a change in a person causing the person to  
temporarily leaving the real world
or that an event in the world
opens up an alternative cognitive world

both these theories seem far fetched
 most experiences of emotion
do not seem related to 
anything but the real world

in the sense that emotions come from a part of the brain
which we have no direct control over
the description of alternative world has some value
but it is too vague and misleading
as if myths were intruding in our lives 

the Panksepps "the seven sins of evolutionary biology"
suggests that proof for emotion 
as an example of evolutionary biology is sparse

if our conscious cortex did not notice 
that it was developing a system 
that provides the beginning and the purpose
for every thought word and action
at any time in human development 
or in any given life
then what was making this system
​dna


​ 



  
 



 





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  • introduction
    • emotion : definition >
      • how the mind works
      • why live
      • why be happy
    • DNA >
      • survival
      • artificial intelligence
      • the self
      • reasons for living overlap
      • behind the reasons >
        • dna extended phenotype
        • overcome adversity
      • Meaning, which makes us content
    • who are you
    • DNA the architect of mind​
    • happiness fear and humour
  • the uselessness of mystery
  • invent happiness
    • unhappiness
    • positive emotions
    • negative emotions
    • mechanisms >
      • programmed
  • failures of emotions
    • the master
    • the gap
    • the other side of the gap
    • ignorance
    • binary versus analogue
    • blindness
    • challenges
    • escalation
    • power
    • mental illness is emotions out of control
    • drugs
    • crime
  • solutions
    • simple rules
    • diligence
    • focus
    • equanimity
    • awareness
    • intuitive
    • DNA vs you
  • humour
  • fear
  • depression
  • emotion meter
  • quiz
    • quiz answer
  • religion
  • questions for you
  • Emotions are autonomous
  • moods , feelings
  • the self and beneficial AI
  • you don't know what you are doing
  • emotions as weapons
  • stoicism
  • derivative thinking
  • taming the amygdala
  • criticism
  • philosophy
  • dna directives.
  • philosophers and emotions
  • philosophers
  • dna the designer...proof
  • response to emotions
  • science and emotion
  • social behaviour and emotions
  • emotions and politics
  • conatus
  • science
  • modern socioeconomic happiness
  • free will
  • introduction
  • dopamine and neurotransmitters
  • input process output